System Adjustments
The waves of peasant protests and general dissent against the French-inspired educational system caused the government to look to other countries for inspiration and aims. In 1879, the government issued an Education Ordinance that looked to the American system rather than the French one for inspiration. It saw a return to many of the Confucian-inspired lessons from the past,[1] but more importantly it allowed the local governments to exercise more freedom over the school system, which in turn led to one of the only decreases in school attendance observed during the Meiji period. By 1885, the Meiji government had dropped the American system for the Prussian system, which had a centralized style like that of France but encouraged loyalty to the state above all else, including egalitarianism. This encouragement of nationalism and patriotism seemed well-suited to the needs of Japan at the time by the Meiji government.[2] Thereby, the government expected schools to instill Japanese nationalist thoughts into the minds of their students above all else.[3]
[1] Motoda Nagazene, Imperial Rescript: The Great Principles of Education, 1879. In Children and Youth in History, George Mason University.
[2] Michio, Tradition and Modernization, 38-39.
[3] Motoyama Yukihiko, Proliferating Talent: Essays on Politics, Thought, and Education in the Meiji Era (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1997), 274.
[1] Motoda Nagazene, Imperial Rescript: The Great Principles of Education, 1879. In Children and Youth in History, George Mason University.
[2] Michio, Tradition and Modernization, 38-39.
[3] Motoyama Yukihiko, Proliferating Talent: Essays on Politics, Thought, and Education in the Meiji Era (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1997), 274.